Iron Kingdoms with Grim Tales

[GIBattiste]

Wow, that was some good stuff I hadn't thought off... That would destroy people with massive damage. After just rereading the damage section, It still comes down to a DC 15 fort save. So, if we look at the big caster with 19 levels, most of his spells top out before 19D* and with the fireball example, (Tops out at 10 I think) we are looking at a blast of a max of 60 points without any feats. This will overcome anyones threshold. A barbarian with an 18 con, however, with 10 points of AC could concieveably take that hit, however. A 20th level fighter could as well, by this time in his career. There are nastier spells though, so lets look at 60 as a base damage. This will overcome your resistance. If you are a Rogue type, chances are you have the evade stuff. Most of these damage spells are reflex saves. A few are fort, but most are Ref. A rogue will get two saves or die. This betters the characters chances. A fighter type is going to have a GOOD fort save at 10th level or at 20th, and making a 15 isn't too hard. Both tough and strong heros have a 50/50 base save at 10th level, better at 20. Chances are, at 20th, these characters are going to be worried about a critical fumble, and that is about it.

Not that your arguement didn't convince me. Lower magic in this regard might be better. Some things in IK, however, require a caster level of 9. (creating undead thralls) and this would become much harder to do in straight GT.

Spell burn, you are right. I think I will go with a straight +2 resistance feat or talent. I might make this a feat to keep it readily available. Spell burn feat to keep you above one CON? Never! That is too much fun! A caster should be better about managing his spells then to have to get his STR down, and then worry about his CON hitting 0.

Thanks for the help though. This is the kind of stuff I was looking for, and not getting at Privateer.

Battiste

 

[GlassJaw]

This is the kind of stuff I was looking for, and not getting at Privateer.

Heh, EN Worlders don't mess around.

But yeah, from what I've gathered about IK, it's not necessarily as low-magic as GT assumes. If you want to play IK pretty close to "as-is", you are probably better just keeping the standard D&D system.

Now what I plan to do is use GT as my base and borrow elements from IK instead of vice versa. I know my campaign idea will be much darker than IK but that's what I want.

 

[Wulf Ratbane]

Caster Level

It sounds like your problem with caster level isn't so much in terms of effect, but merely making the caster level check. You really don't need a full 20 caster levels for effect, in my opinion.

Grim Tales already provides a couple of ways to make that caster level check.

If you use Action Points-- and I strongly recommend that you do, as they are an important 'balancing factor' for Grim Tales-- then making a caster level check usually becomes a matter of spending an AP in a pinch.

You can also spend additional casting time to improve your caster level check.

But there's certainly nothing that says you couldn't add other ways to improve the caster level check. A feat ('Gifted Spellcaster'?) that offers a bonus to caster level checks would be just fine.

By making it easier to make the caster level check, you lower the bar on the attempt to cast a spell, without raising the bar on the effect that is subsequently produced.

I also recommend you download and adapt the ley lines and power nexus rules here for other ways to improve the caster level (and otherwise make spellcasting more interesting overall!)

Spell Burn Resistance

You should not have a feat that improves spell burn resistance. I can't recommend against this strongly enough. First, it fails to pass the simplest of 'broken' tests: Everyone will take it. Second, it's unnecessary. A spellcaster should increase his spellcasting attribute (every 4 levels) in order to improve his spell burn resistance. That's enough.

If any spellcaster in your game is able to reduce his chances of taking spell burn to "only on a 1" at caster level 1, you've seriously erred.

Please also don't overlook the Spell Preparation feat that is already in Grim Tales, which allows spellcasters to prepare a few spells in advance, and re-roll the spell burn dice if they turn up bad.

 

[GIBattiste]

Yeah, the ley lines bit helps, and being that in my IK game, the group is working with ley line study, there is some precident for my group in that direction.

Now I have to make a confession as to being a twit. I was looking over things, thinking that you needed caster level to get access to spells of a certain level.

This was such a fallicy on my part.

With the example in GTs of the guy casting a third level spell, and taking 3d6 to his con... Did he have the requirements for a third level spell? Nope, so why would a wizard need to be 17th level to be looking at 9th level stuff.

Lightbulb went off, and I feel dumb.

So, now the only real issue I have is with certain IK feats and abilities needing a caster level, and I think ley lines and nexus points would fix that.

I am already using the action dice/points idea in my group. So far we have only been using those as D6 to any D20 roll before you know the result. When we convert over, I plan on taking the straight D6 from GT with popping 6s. I am playing in a Stargate group as well, and we are low enough level that we roll D4s on the graduated scale. I really think a 25% pop rate is too high, and at higher levels, you luck tends to level off.

Sorry for the digression.

Yeah, spell burn will run as is... This was one of the mechanics that sold me on this system. I really wanted to get away from "vancian" spell systems, and felt that most spell point systems were the same thing, under a new name.

Thanks for the input.

Battiste

 

[GIBattiste]

New question on spell casting.

On pg 130-1 in GT, the exampled smart hero becomes an arcane caster. He has 1 spell casting level, and casts a third level fireball.

Since he has only one spell casting level, am I right in assuming that he casts a fireball that does a whole 1D6 damage? (d6 per level)

Fiery splinders that is not... Just trying to check on that for power level. Thanks

Battiste

 

[John Q. Mayhem]

New question on spell casting.

On pg 130-1 in GT, the exampled smart hero becomes an arcane caster. He has 1 spell casting level, and casts a third level fireball.

Since he has only one spell casting level, am I right in assuming that he casts a fireball that does a whole 1D6 damage? (d6 per level)

Fiery splinders that is not... Just trying to check on that for power level. Thanks

Battiste

I asked that question myself a while back. Wulf told me that the caster level is a minimum of the spell level, so it's 3d6...enough to kill lots o' mooks, and trigger some MDS's, too.

 

[GIBattiste]

Alright, I am on vacation from work, and trying to do a bit more work on this system idea.


As you know, I am trying to get a bit more magic heavy then GT, but still much less magic then standard D20 D&D. I would like to ask for some suggestions as to spell aquisition. I was thinking about allowing arcane spell casters get two spells automatically every time they up a caster level. I would also most likely allow a caster to learn up to his casting stat modifier in additional spells if he could find them. The Iron Kingdoms makes a lot of use of a few very powerful wizards guilds. I would like to offer more flavor to the guilds by giving them a list of specialty spells. I was thinking about having maybe two spells per level, setup like two domains for a cleric. These spells would be made available to guild members, allowing in effect a free spell to learn every level. How does this sound? I think this would make guilds important, and give the players a motivation to seek membership, and to give each of them a different flavor of specialization.

Now my big question is about clerics. Since the gods play a big role in this game, (Not as much as FR or GH, but they give spells etc.) I don't feel it proper to limit clerics quite the same as wizards, but I also don't want to give them the freedom they are given in D&D. (this would lead to the end of arcane casters.) I have thought about making them pick what spells, and domains they get to cast from, much like above. I don't know if this is quite fair, being that I don't see as much oppritunity for a cleric to learn a new prayer, as a mage to find a spell book. Perhaps I can just make clerics find old, forgotten prayers...
A cleric has always had more freedom in spells then a mage, and the difference is still very important in a game like this. How would you handle a cleric feel, but keep it in line with a wizard maxing out at two to four spells a caster level?
Battiste

 

[Wulf Ratbane]

How would you handle a cleric feel, but keep it in line with a wizard maxing out at two to four spells a caster level?

Well, personally, I think 2-4 spells per caster level is way too much. But you already know how I feel about that.

Going with guilds is a very good idea because it allows you, the GM, to control the spells that the player knows. There is almost no point to curtailing the amount or type of magic available in your world if you allow the PCs to pick their own spells-- they're going to pick spells for overkill. You won't get the feel that you want out of the game.

It won't feel like a world suffused with mysterious and often dangerous magic, it will feel like a world where every 1st level caster has magic missle and every 3rd level caster has fireball (or haste) and every 5th level caster with any sense has Shadow Evocation.

If I am playing in your game, and I know that it is difficult to learn spells, but you give me the ability to choose what spells I learn, that puts a great stress on me to pick the absolute best possible spell at each level.

So set up multiple guilds, with lots of different kinds of barriers to entry (some require gold, some require time spent in research, some require XP expenditure, and some require roleplaying sacrifices), and each guild has a set of 9 spells (one of each level) that they know and teach. YOU should be choosing the spells that are available to learn in your game world.

There's really no functional reason that divine and arcane casters can't be set up along the same lines. Whether the divine caster is learning a new "prayer" or a new "ritual" or a new "Holy Revelation of the Higher Orders" or whatever-- it's all semantics.

 

[MoogleEmpMog]

I would have the clerics get two domain spells/level only, plus the ability to channel them to cure/inflict. With the pain of healing rules, that should be sufficient restriction.

And Wulf, with the way guilds in the IK are set up, there's no way a character could be a member of more than one unless he was also a double agent. Almost all the guilds are ultra-nationalistic and antagonistic.

 

[GIBattiste]

Well, all the shadow spells (evocation, conjuration) carry a nasty pricetag in Iron Kingdoms of only being available to those associated with the Infernals. Infernals are a much scarier thing then demons and devils. Infernals steal souls, and come from a realm much like that described in "Event Horizon." Only the very mad would delve there.

The big reason I wanted to have some more spells on the table, was that the Iron Kingdoms is lush with "mechanika" and steamjacks. Both of these require magic, and spells to create. I have no problem with a tight spell limit of one or two arcane spells per level on a caster. That would make the RPG feel much more like the table top war game. Warmachine doesn't have to think about how the items of the world are made, though. I do. That is why I felt I should open up some more spells to wizards. I still may have two lists per guild, either to keep it on par with the clerics domains (I am SOOO limiting the clerics as stated above) or just give the wizard a choice between the two available spells.

Item creation though, becomes so rare, and this world doesn't support it. If anything, this world is more Mechinikally infused then magic infused. (Mechanika is a short lived magic item assisted by the use of science. Items end up being cheaper, more modular, and cost effective. The limitation is that the items run on an arcane "battery" that has charges drained from it per use/daily.) These items require certain spells, being that we are working with a world that was made to plug almost directly into 3.5.

To get around this I see two options. One, Just require raw magic at a needed level to create the items... (Jacks, lightning swords, whatever.) Two, Allow wizards who have access to their guild, and guild libraries, to cast spells directly from a book. Three of the five wizards guilds are military orders, so I should give them either protection or damage spells, so this would open up some options for spells that their members wouldn't memorize. I am really thinking about doing away with the sorcerer, and running wizards in much the same way. They memorize a spell, and don't carry books, but can cast spells from a spell book, if they have hours to spend on the task.

Comments, suggestions?

Thanks as always.
Battiste